Composer hopes to scale new heights
Classical composer and University of Queensland PhD student Kent Farbach is hoping he will have the same success with fish scales as he has had with the musical scales he uses to construct his internationally-recognised works.
For once, Mr Farbach, 37, who is studying for his PhD in music composition under the supervision of Dr Philip Bracanin, is quite happy for people to think his latest creation is a bit "on the nose".
Following in the footsteps of great composers such as Stravinsky and Elgar, as well as a family tradition which saw his great-great grandfather invent central heating and rotating hospital beds, Mr Farbach has turned his hand to invention of the non-musical variety.
And he is more nervous about how his latest work will be received than the most recent of his many successes, winning the $15,000 Queensland Philharmonic Orchestra's 1997 Corbould composition prize for the second movement of his cello concerto titled Your Affections ... I remember.
Although The Aussie Fish-n-board is not nearly as poetic-sounding, Mr Farbach hopes it makes the same impression as his cello concerto.
Two years after thinking about a way to stop his small aluminium runabout from "stinking the yard out" a few days after a fishing expedition, Mr Farbach's simple but effective solution is set to go on the market in the United States, Europe, New Zealand and South Africa.
The $39.95 device, which recently went on sale around Australia, is a table which can be attached to the side of boats of any size, and even the bull-bars of four-wheel-drive vehicles, to allow a fishing enthusiast to scale and fillet the days' catch, or to cut bait or berley.
"The trouble is that when you are cleaning fish on board a small boat the scales go everywhere, and no matter how well you clean up afterwards you miss a bit, which means the boat is well and truly on the nose a few days later," Mr Farbach said.
"So I came up with the idea, then went to have a look at what was already available and found that the only choices were quite expensive and suitable only for big boats."
Mr Farbach started working his way through various prototypes, and with the help of wife Carolyn, who has a graphic arts degree, finally came up with a design worth patenting.
He has since been juggling his PhD work and weekly tutoring at the University with everything from negotiating with plastic moulding companies to organising an extensive national advertising campaign.
With the product now finding its way onto the shelves, Mr Farbach is finally beginning to receive some financial return from the $60,000 he has spent from conception to execution.
He hopes the real rewards lie just ahead, particularly in the lucrative American market where fishing is one of the most popular recreations and devotees are known to spend their money on the latest "must-have" gadget.
"Three American companies are interested at the moment, " Mr Farbach said. "There are a lot of fishing fanatics among the population of 280 million, so the potential to get some of the money I have put into the thing is certainly there."
The project led Mr Farbach to go part-time with his PhD studies, although he hopes to submit his six major works for consideration in time to graduate next year.
One of the PhD works was performed earlier this year, a 70-minute film score for the classic 1927 Australian silent film The Kid Stakes, based around the antics of the character Fatty Finn.
He has also been commissioned by the Noosa Federation of Arts to compose a 20-minute "environment inspired" orchestra piece titled The Noosa Suite for the opening of the new Noosa Heads cultural centre.
For further information, contact Mr Farbach on 07 3379-8281.
